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Monthly Archives: July 2017

I have had a long week and I hadn’t had the ability to stay home due to appointments, planned events, and errands. Today, I was supposed to attend my boyfriend’s family dinner; these happen every Sunday. I did not want to go and even though I tried to get myself going, I just couldn’t. So, I told my boyfriend that I would stay home today. He and his grandmother got ready and I stayed home. At first it was good but, PTSD always rears its ugly head.

Luckily, I was able to stay fairly stable until my boyfriend got home. Sadly, he was unaware that the smell of tequila on his breath would send me into a flashback. This was unfortunate not for me but for him. He tries to stay away from triggers but, today he triggered one without meaning to. About 10 minutes later, he had to leave for work so he remained talking to me on the phone. About an hour into his shift, I get a message asking me to play some games with my friends. I at first agree but after an hour or so, I had to tell them that I wanted to reschedule.

I find that I have these days at least once a week. I try to tell myself that this is okay but, I always feel bad about it. I am unsure at this point if this is caused by PTSD, anxiety, depression, or stress but, I plan on doing some research. The more information I have, the better I can manage the symptoms. This habit of researching my symptoms and talking to other people with my problems, has helped me create coping mechanisms as well as handle the situations better. I find knowledge is truly power; it gives me the facts and I better understand what I can and cannot fix and ideas on how to deal with them. Hopefully, tomorrow will be better.

If all goes as planned, I am going to try and do a memoir/poem for my next blog to lighten up my posts as well as, give you guys some insight on how my brain thinks. Have a good day/night and thanks for reading.

I have tried many coping mechanisms in my life but, today I thought to change one of my mechanisms slightly. I got really upset and started going for a walk. Now, this is something that I do quite often but instead of aimless walking and getting myself lost to make myself find my way back, I turned around at the halfway point. I walked until I found the road that I recognized had a park. At the park, I realized that there was a large area of grass, flowers, and a few trees. I sat down under a really nice shady tree in the grass and made myself breathe. With each deep breath, I tried to get myself out of my head and on the nature around me. While I did this, I started picking up blades of grass and tying them around a small stick that I found. I got about 3/4ths of the stick covered before I started to come back to the present. First, I noticed the wind; it was quite brisk but it smelled really good; there was the smell of freshly cut grass, cookouts, and the residual smell of rain. Then, I noticed children playing and the sound of laughter. Children’s laughter is a wonderful thing for me and it made me instantly feel a little better. Next, the grass made itself known underneath me. It was cool and soft with just enough give to remain comfortable. The soil was also cool and still slightly damp but, I didn’t mind it much. I then turned my eyes to the flowers. There were 3 different kinds: little white flowers, small purple flowers, and some yellow flowers that looked like small bundles of bells. They were very pretty littered through the grass and clovers. At this point, I began to pick the flowers and make a small flower wreath that I then put on before lying in the grass. It was very comfortable and it made me think of nature and how we almost never take time to pay attention. I recalled back to my favorite place when I was a child; it was a small pool of water that had a waterfall with a cave under it surrounded by trees. This area was my favorite escape because although it was in the middle of the neighborhood, you could not hear anything but the sound of the waterfall and subsequent brook. It was heavenly. By this point, I felt much better and was able to walk on home. Thank goodness for nature and the sound of laughing children.

This question bugs me to my core. PTSD, or post traumatic stress disorder, is not limited to those in the military. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, PTSD can be caused by a shocking, scary, or dangerous event that triggered a flight-or-flight response; this is meant to protect a person from harm. In chronic PTSD, which I have, the person experiences re-experiences of the trauma (flashbacks), avoidance, bad dreams, easily startled, feeling tense or on edge, feelings of guilt or blame, and frightening thoughts. Often, those with PTSD also inherit anxiety disorders.

I have PTSD due to years of sexual/physical/emotional abuse and several near death experiences. All of these triggered the fight response in me as a child and it has physically distorted areas in my brain. Childhood trauma is also very bad for the brain because it is effecting it in a more long term manner. Trauma in children has long lasting effects because the brains are still being developed and the changes that the brain undergoes at these stages are extremely important for development and personality.

Today was a much better day. I just finished my sociology class and started my childhood psychology class today. I finished my previous class with a 98% A which made me pretty happy. (I go to an online school due to my 24/7 ‘job’ as a caretaker) Childhood psychology should be an easy class for me thankfully. I spent many years learning about psychology and biology which is the basis of this class along with development. I only have two more classes before I go back in the field and boy am I excited! I also had fun playing a tad geeky game called World of Darkness. World of Darkness is a game similar to D&D but, it is focused on horror and role-play more than turn based combat. We have been playing this particular story-line for a little over 2 years and we are coming to the end of the game.

I did have one downside however because I managed to injure myself yesterday. Now, I should elaborate first on why this would happen; I have something called Ehlers Danlos Syndrome. This, at least in my type (III), causes me to be hyper-mobile and I dislocate very easily and I have to train my muscles to make up for my joints. (My shoulders dislocate, or at least sublux, 4-6 times a day. Think of my joints as an old overstretched rubber band.) I was working out at the gym and I went to the dead-lift bar and I forgot to remove the weights before lowering the bar below my head. (Our gym has an assist bar that has the barbell set on cables to make sure that the person doesn’t get injured when they are without a spotter) This caused my back to dislocate in several places along with my shoulders.

Is there any questions you have for me or anything you would like to see me write about? Let me know! Thank you for reading, have a wonderful night/day.

Today it was very difficult to realize that it has been 2 years since I have seen the 2 siblings that I grew up with. My brother is 16 now and he has a girlfriend and my sister is 11 but, I haven’t been able to even talk with them. Why, you may ask; I cannot go to my mothers without her making everything worse. She always brings up the past and she is continuously uncivil. It pains me every day that I can’t even talk to them because of her. She has made it quite clear that I have to see her to talk to them but, my therapist and everyone I know has confirmed that I am better when I do not see her or speak with her.

I think the worst part is that my siblings and I have always had a very close relationship. Due to my mother’s nymphomania and her men, I ended up raising them on my own. Once I turned about 7, I took the role of helping to care and raise my brother and keeping him as ignorant of our mother’s actions as possible. It seemed normal to him and my later sister that I took care of everything. I was always their confidant and I helped them with everything that I could. I was their ‘mother’, tutor, and friend. I was never allowed to go outside and play or have friends so, my siblings were my life for most of my adolescent years.

I remember one day, I had left for school with my brother (I had to walk him to school then walk 5 miles to my school because they did not want woken up) and left my sister in her highchair. This was apparently the wrong thing to do in her eyes. I was grounded for 4 months (the entire summer) because I left my sister with food in a high chair. Mind you, I was only about 15 at the time and I was unsure what to do. If I tried to wake my mother, it would go to no avail because she was being drugged to a near comatose state. If I tried to wake her boyfriend at the time, I would be beaten for getting him up earlier and he wanted. This is the same man that dragged me by my hair for biking to school in the rain and then beaten. What would you do in this situation?

I remember when my brother had a project for school, he named me as his hero/role model and I about burst into tears. My mother got really jealous and for the next month she wouldn’t allow me to do anything that I wanted. It was like being grounded without actually being grounded. This wasn’t something that was abnormal either; she consistently would ground me or blackmail me to ensure that I would do as she wanted. Blackmail was a particular favorite of hers but, that wasn’t the bad part; she would blackmail me with things that I hadn’t done. She would threaten to tell my grandmother or whoever that I did things that were in fact done by her. I was always blamed for doing things that was done by her. For example, she wrote to her boyfriend in jail and told everyone that it was me who was getting in contact with him and really wanted him back. To be honest, I have no idea how people believed his to be true because I was the one that sent him to jail. He had beaten my brother, sister, mother, and myself. The only reason I didn’t end up being killed was due to my martial arts training. He was a marine and very strong. In the end, I ended up breaking his arm, leg, ribs, jaw, and causing him to blackout because he would not stop. I went to school the next day with bruises on my neck from being choked and several bruises and cuts all over my body. Thank goodness for my science teacher reporting it and helping me through it.

I miss my brother and sister so much. When I was emancipated, I would return to my mothers to see them. My brother for the first year would never leave my side when I showed up. He would remind me over and over that he loved me and that I was his favorite. At home, he was required to act as if our 6 step siblings were our real siblings but we barely knew them. They were quite cruel to them and I would always have to help them cope with it. My sister unfortunately went from being slightly behind to several years behind. She was always slow but with patient assistance, she would pick up things fairly well but, my mother refused to take the time to help her. She was then counted as retarded when in fact, she is not getting the one on one help she needs. I know this because every time I would come over and help her with her work, she would understand it. I worry for them but, I can’t see them until they are 18 years old. This hurts me more than I can explain.

Sorry for the random blurb of information but, free writing is the best way for me to tell you without breaking down. Thank you for reading and have a good night/day.

So, today I woke up with a sense of impending doom. I did not know entirely why until a few hours later. I went around the house doing what I normally do and trying to make myself feel better but everything seemed to be in vain.

Then it happened, a sudden panic attack followed by a flashback. I started to pant and it felt like an elephant was on my chest. I started trying to breathe but, I could not seem to catch my breath. It started with a smell; it was something similar to that of wood and incense. Then I saw him, the tall linky man of my nightmares. He was my mother’s current boyfriend and the worst of all. I see him walking up the stairs to my room with a look of hunger in his eyes. Behind him I see my mother in a drugged out haze. She doesn’t seem to notice or care that I am telling them to get out of my room. Then they walk to the side of my bed and he takes off her clothes. He then stares right at me and tells me that I better watch and he then has his way with my mother. The scene flickers and I am running in the house trying to get away from him as he is chasing me around the house in an angry rage for taking my bike to school on a rainy day. (I had to walk to school everyday but, it was pouring and I wanted to get there faster. He picked me up one block from the school and forced me to stay home.) He catches me by the hair and lifts me up. I am thrown into the baby gate and I start to bleed and I cry out but, my mother is in a near comatose state from prescription drugs that he has forced her to take. It shifts again, he is offering to teach me how to fight and to not be surprised at anything. He claims that he has to touch my privates to make me numb to the feeling. I try to pull away but, he forces me into his lap and makes me move no matter how much I cried. Another vision comes forth, I am tied down and he has a lighter and it is moving towards my privates again and it goes black. I am sweating and trying to breath and forget what I just saw. My mind is groggy and I try to ground myself in the location I am in.

I got up and went to the bathroom to splash water and my face and make it so that no one can tell what happened. I stare in the mirror trying to make my face into a convincing smile while, reassuring myself that everything is okay now. I left the bathroom and sat down on the couch to watch TV. Moments later, my boyfriend’s grandmother wakes up and needs help to got to the bathroom and my day fully begins. To help with the pain, I turn to the only thing that helps… cannabis.

I read several years before this about the benefits of cannabis but, I never realized just how well it really worked until I decided to try it again about 4 years ago. In the past I smoked but, I was unaware of the benefits that it had. I was given it at the age of 9 and I smoked off and on for years. It wasn’t until I was 18 that I truly decided to try it as a daily medication. To this day, it is the only solace that I have. I even found that I am able to better concentrate and go to school when I smoke. I went from being a c average student to a straight A student. It was then that I decided that it was best to continue. Thank goodness that it will be medically legal here in about 2 months.

I think I will end here for now, thank you for reading. Have a good day/night.

Okay, so I figured that I should make a post about my family and the crazy relations before I delve too far. All in all I have 15 siblings but, not a single one is full blooded and only 6 of which are step siblings. Even weirder, my first cousins are also my siblings. My father has a brother and my father married his brother’s ex wife. My great grandma is referred to as grandma and my grandma is my nana. I have 2 uncles but the ages are a little odd. grandma has my nana and B. B is 36 years younger than his sister and only 4 years younger than my mother. My mother’s brother is closer to my age with only about 6 years apart. We both grew up with our uncles that were close enough in age to be our brothers.

So first of My mother was 16 when she had me (all of the women besides me have had children really early in life) and she had dropped out of high school along with her new husband. They only got married because I was conceived. Five years later, my brother is born but his father is another man. Things get really hairy (more on this later) and my father tries to kill my mother and I don’t see him for a while (due to jail time but, not for long).

We then go to live with my great grandmother (grandma) for about 6 months before we move in with her long time lover. This man is responsible for my little sister about 5 years later and most of my horrors. After about 6 years of living with him (in Hell) we all go live in a homeless shelter before getting picked up by grandma again.

This time I notice that my grandmother is not as nice as she seems. We have several fights and she was consistently verbally abusive but, she did become physical at times. My mother leaves and goes on her own. She has several men before settling with another terrible man. After this man and several years of relapse with this man, she gets with my new stepfather. Things are better but this is how she accumulated 6 step children. Years later they also have another daughter… This child is 20 years apart from me and I have never met her.

My father had several wives as well and to his second wife, he had 3 children and only one of which is still living with him. His third wife is his current wife; this is the woman who was previously my aunt. She had 3 kids. This is the quickest way to explain the important facts about my crazy family and relations.

Hi everyone, I am a 21 year old woman who is an aspiring teacher living with PTSD. I am currently in college working on my Early Childhood Education degree in order to teach second grade. I do not plan on telling my name at least at the moment to keep my identity safe from my family and abusers.

My point in writing this blog is to help me cope with my PTSD. While I am sure I will touch on this more later, in short, my mother had me very young and she had a long string of bad husbands/boyfriends whom were abusive in all senses of the word. I was abused from ages 5-17 from both the men and my own family. I was emancipated at 17 years old. I live with my boyfriend and his grandmother with dementia. I stay home full time to take care of her while he works; this can sometimes cause my thoughts and flashbacks to be worse due to seclusion. I plan on this blog being more than just this though; I want to also use it to talk about my life and everything (that is interesting or worth talking about) that happens to me.